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carbon fibre front top plate mod

matt_andhisbaja mentioned in the carbon fibre post recently that he had broke the main chassis as the top plate is not strong enough. Some of this has already been posted in the recent carbon fibre post not that long ago, but thought I'd post further on everything that I have done in case someone would like to do the same. I have broken a couple of top plates but not the main chassis, but prevention is better than the cure, so came up with this. Only reason why this happened was because I had a spare top plate that I was going to swap out for the one that was on there but never got round to it and to save buying a new allow top plate.

Basically I just put the new top plate on the car and then put the old top plate on top effectively doubling the strength. The top plate now, although in two separate top plates is 8mm thick. Main problem I had was the rear of the 2 plastic shock tower supports were 4mm higher.

I also put a thick bit of plastic on top of the top plate, it basically just supports the top hinge pin mount in those big front impacts. The front hinge pin mount is IRC so well tough, but there is nothing to support the rear so I stuck the plastic on there. I first put in on with countersunk bolts but as the bolts tightened up they tried to push the plastic apart opening up the hole. So used dome head hex bolts instead which meant I could get the bolts really tight. The two front bolts are the original chassis mounting holes, the rear one I drilled a hole right through the chassis.

Incidentally, you can see two other mods that I have done in the pics, first one is the IRC top shock mount using fuel pipe, much better than metal and the second is the steering whipper arm lower mount support. I found that the plastic mount made the carbon chassis holes go oval so put these alluminium plates in the bottom of the chassis. They work two fold, firstly supporting the whipper arm mount stopping it moving side ways and secondly, they have a thread in them where I can then screw the Uber front bumper too. This also adds strength to the front end as the uber bumper does not want to bend. Its also really good at front impacts with the top of the bumper disconnected from the chassis. It becomes much more springy absorbing a lot more shock.

Come up with this to lower the rear of the shock tower plastic supports. They are 4mm higher than what they are supposed to be which pushes the shock tower more forward. Its really for aesthetics but think this will work. Got some stainless steel pipe, its 12mm O/D x 10mm I/D to go over the plastic. I used a pipe cutter to cut 3cm long sleeves. I really needed 9.5 I/D but just couldn't get it. I put a long screw down the inside of the support, cut the end off, then screwed the two bits together with the stainless steel sleeve round the outside.

I tried to pull these apart and there was no way I could do it. Only thing I can see happening is the screw snapping but hopefully it won't. I have got some 9mm I/D pipe on order which I might possibly be able to get over the plastic. I am going to make a spare set up, either with the 9mm I/D pipe or 10mm I/D I originally used.

Think the visual affect of the stainless steel sleeves looks really cool and that the front end should be tough enough now for anything thrown at it